


Contrasting Colors

by Brigdh



Category: Vantablack pigment feud RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magic, Enemies to Lovers, First Time, Light Dom/sub, M/M, Yuletide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-14
Updated: 2017-12-14
Packaged: 2019-02-14 21:14:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,831
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13016256
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Brigdh/pseuds/Brigdh
Summary: Stuart Semple and Anish Kapoor have extremely different views on the idea of sharing Vantablack with the wider artistic community. But this time, Vantablack isn't a color; it's a spell. Their rivalry, however, might just be disguised sexual tension.





	Contrasting Colors

**Author's Note:**

  * For [marginaliana](https://archiveofourown.org/users/marginaliana/gifts).



“Watches?” Semple sputtered. “He made watches?”

“Watches that are selling for a hundred thousand dollars, no less. They say the Vantablack makes it look like the parts are floating – you know, the gears and the second hand and… whatever else goes into a watch, hell, I don’t know.” Sophie tilted her iPad and frowned. “It probably looks better in person.”

“It’s hard to capture Vantablack in photos,” Semple said automatically, then wondered why he was defending Kapoor. He had seen Vantablack once, during one of the interviews that had proliferated after he'd started what the magazines and blogs insisted on calling an 'art feud'. He hadn't gotten to use it, of course. But he'd held it in his hand for a moment, the spell locked away for safety in a transparent glass globe. It had been just the size to fit in the palm of his hand. From a distance it didn’t look too different from a 8-ball, but held close to the eye, the black revealed itself as an infinity of minuscule dots, like the reverse image of a distant galaxy. Semple had given it a shake and the dots swirled gently in response. They moved slower than the speed of his hand, as though something heavy dragged them back. The thing gave off the slightest hint of static electricity, a buzzing so faint that it seemed to disappear if his attention wasn't focused on it, the nearly imperceptible prickle fading away into nothingness.

Here and now, he grabbed the French Press sitting on the table between them and refilled his mug, then took a quick swallow without adding his usual milk and sugar. The coffee burned down his throat, chasing away a taste he preferred not to acknowledge but which might just have been bitterness. “How is this art? What does Anish say about it?”

“Oh, it’s Anish now, huh?”

“Just let me see – “ Semple leaned over the table, reaching for the iPad, but Sophie held it out of his reach until he relented and slumped back into his chair.

“I’ll look.” Sophie hummed as she scrolled through the article. Semple was fairly certain she was deliberately taking her time to annoy him, but he knew from experience that accusing her of doing so would only result in Sophie dragging it out for even longer. He distracted himself by watching the people brunching at the tables around them, the young couples and groups of friends loudly and somewhat drunkenly enjoying themselves on a rare sunny Sunday morning in London. He normally would have liked studying such strangers, their fashionable clothes, slang, topics of conversation all potential subjects for future art. Now, though, he couldn’t focus; his mind kept returning to Anish –  _Kapoor_  – and watches, puzzling out his potential justifications, preparing how he would respond to each argument. Semple closed his eyes and pictured Anish constructing a watch by hand, though he knew that wasn’t how these things worked. Still, in his imagination Anish slowly set a delicate mechanism in place, his sturdy fingers moving with graceful strength, the middle one still dyed faintly pink. A shiver moved under his skin, entirely unrelated to the warm day, and Semple smiled.

Finally Sophie looked up at him with a short laugh, and Semple blinked back to awareness of his current surroundings. “Nothing.”

“What do you mean, nothing?”

“I mean nothing! There’s no interview with him, no quotes; it doesn’t even mention Kapoor except to say that his signature will be engraved on each watch.”

Semple couldn’t hold back a groan. “You have got to be kidding me.”

“You’re the one who said he was – what was that quote? – ‘a reactionary capitalist rotter with no principles, who put the promotion of his own brand over the artistic values of sharing knowledge’. Since his first public use of Vantablack appears to be producing boring watches that go for a hundred K each, ‘unprincipled’ sounds pretty accurate.” Sophie tilted her head and treated him to a smug grin. “I’d say you won the feud.”

Semple didn’t feel victorious. Something disappointed and chilly settled behind his ribs, and he had to look away so Sophie wouldn’t recognize the expression in his eyes.

She knew him too well. “What’s the matter? You won’t even need to make a statement; everyone who sees this is going to recognize that you were right about Kapoor all along.”

“Yeah. It’s just….” He struggled to put the sense of angry discontent into words. “It feels too easy.”

Sophie raised both eyebrows and waited.

Semple shrugged miserably. “I thought he’d put up more of a fight.” That wasn’t quite right, but it was close enough. He’d liked the feud, Semple realized, and not for some altruistic motive of bringing his artistic ethics to the public’s attention. Anish’s responses had been a challenge, but one Semple had enjoyed meeting. It had given him something to fight for. His brain had raced with new possibilities, his heart had pounded whenever he faced Anish, his body had felt more alive, ready for anything.

He wanted… he didn’t know what he wanted. Slowly, though, Semple realized what he was going to do next. He’d just have to come up with an idea so provocative Anish  _had_  to respond to it. And to him.

* * *

Semple stepped forward into the camera’s view accompanied by two animals, their loose bridles clutched two-together in his right hand. They were unicorns, a bit shorter and more delicately built than horses, their heads only slightly topping Semple’s shoulders, but otherwise identical except for their long thin horns. That wasn’t shocking; unicorns might be rare, but they were far from unknown in the wizarding world. It was their colors that had Kapoor’s mouth dropping open until he wrenched it closed into a firm scowl. The first was pink – a vivid luminescent pink that Kapoor couldn’t help but recognize as the same color that still stained his middle finger – that shaded into an equally garish purple around the unicorn’s muzzle and fetlocks. The second was black. Not Vantablack, of course; Kapoor could be certain of that even if the unicorn hadn’t remotely approached the deep, eye-defying black of his own spell. This would have been a perfectly unremarkable black, except that as the animal stepped forward it caught the light in an innumerable rainbow of colors, greens and golds and purples and reds and every other named and unnamed shade, like an oilslick brought to three-dimensional life.

“These are Phaze and Shift,” Semple said in response to some question from the interviewer, but Kapoor let the words wash over him without registering them. He simply stared, and it seemed as though the cameraman felt similarly; the view on-screen abandoned Semple’s grinning face to focus on the ever-shifting colors of Shift’s skin. Appropriate name. 

Kapoor wanted them. He wanted them with a greedy hunger, a physical desire that had him leaning toward the screen, his heart beating harder. Ideas for new art were already percolating in his subconscious, none of them fully formed but all dependent on that mutable, polychromatic Shift. He realized his mouth was open again and once more focused on closing it.

Semple was never going to share. Kapoor didn’t need to check to know that these unicorns would surely come with the same legal disclaimer on their purchase as the spell for pink had – or “The World’s Pinkest Pink” to be more accurate, just the sort of ridiculous bullshit pop-art name Kapoor would expect from Semple, though at least he hadn’t named it “Pinky McPinkFace”. _You confirm that you are not Anish Kapoor, you are in no way affiliated to Anish Kapoor, you are not purchasing this item on behalf of Anish Kapoor or an associate of Anish Kapoor. To the best of your knowledge, information, and belief this spell will not make its way into the hands of Anish Kapoor._  He’d gotten around that once before; he could do it again. He made a fist, pressing his hand hard into his thigh, his brown index finger hiding the goddamn pink one in the middle.

Of course, there was difference between acquiring a color just to shove it in Semple’s face that he had done so and acquiring one to actually use in his art. The first was a countermove in their ongoing feud. The second was admitting defeat.

As if in response to his thoughts, the on-screen Semple said his name. The camera cut back to his face as he tossed his excessive asymmetrical bangs out of his eyes, still grinning wide enough to split his face. He looked even younger than he was, a boy irrepressibly self-pleased by his latest prank. Kapoor hated hipsters. “Color hoarding and robbing are wrong,” he was saying. “Shift and Phaze are the final blow in the Anish Kapoor art war.”

Kapoor angrily waved his hand, dismissing the screen, and Semple’s grin vanished. The second it was gone, Kapoor regretted it – he would need to know what else Semple said to plan his response – but he refused to take back the action. Even if no one else was in the room to see him, some dignity had to be maintained.

He stood and paced from one end of the room to the other, trying to think of how best to crush that cheeky expression of Semple’s. He didn’t know why Semple had decided to focus on him. He wasn’t even sure they’d met; it seemed likely that they would have passed one another at a gallery opening or award show or one of the other events that made up life in the art world, overcrowded with more publicists and self-described critics than actual artists. They’d probably shaken hands, exchanged a few words of meaningless small talk, maybe even stood side-by-side as they considered whatever crap was displayed on the wall. But when Kapoor searched his memory, he couldn’t come up with anything specific. The only images he had of Semple were flat and a bit fuzzy – selfies off his instagram feed, unsteady shots from the cameraman shifting his feet during an interview. Nothing in person, nothing warm with human contact. No reason for Semple to be pissed off at Kapoor personally. 

But if he wanted a feud? Anish Kapoor would give him a fucking feud. 

It was futile. No matter how he tried to focus on clever ripostes, his mind kept returning to that vision of shimmering iridescent not-black. He considered a sphere striped with alternating lines of Vantablack and Shift, half swallowing in the light and giving nothing back, the other half reflecting it like a kaleidoscopic mirror. The underlying shape would be barely discernible; what a demonstration of the irreconcilable duality of shape and light!

 _No_. “No,” he repeated aloud just to be sure that his subconscious got the message. He wasn’t going to give in to Stuart Semple. The mere act of such a collaboration would be a direct contradiction of everything Kapoor had spent the last year standing for. He was not going to renounce his stated principles. Besides, Semple would never agree to it.

* * *

Semple’s keys jingled as he unlocked the door to his studio. It was late and the building should have been empty and dark, but he was tired and at first he didn’t register that the lights being on meant that something was wrong. He entered without looking around, heading toward the storage cabinet tucked behind the drafting tables. Movement in the back of the room caught his attention even through the sleep-deprived muddle that was currently his brain, and he turned to see Shift standing there, summoned out of the bubble dimension where the black unicorn spent most of his time. A man was leaning over to stroke Shift’s muzzle, his back facing Semple. All Semple could see was the stretch of a white button-down shirt across the man’s broad shoulders, but he recognized that it wasn’t one of his assistants or fellow artists or cleaners or anyone else who had a reason to be here.

As though he felt Semple’s gaze on him, the man straightened. He moved without hurry, showing no signs of panic, but kept his back toward Semple. Semple couldn’t have said how – it wasn’t any particular feature – but suddenly he knew who it was.

“How did you get in here?” he called. He stayed where he was; his keys still hung loosely in his hand, the weight of the bag he carried on his left shoulder still pulled him slightly to the side, but he felt as awake as if he’d taken a shot of espresso directly to his veins. Shift huffed out a heavy breath of air, sensing the tension in the room. 

Anish Kapoor turned slowly to face him. “You weren’t supposed to be here.”

“I forgot some supplies.” Semple gestured awkwardly at the storage cabinet that had been his goal.

“I heard you were in New York.”

“Weather. The plane….” Semple cut himself off; Anish didn’t need the whole story. “I’m leaving tomorrow morning instead.”

Anish nodded, accepting the excuse.

The reality of the situation abruptly hit Semple. He was embarrassed to hear himself: stammering out incomplete sentences and nervous explanations. _He_ was the one whose studio had been broken into. He was the one with the law on his side. How had Anish taken control? Semple didn’t have to let him; he was the winner of their feud, proven by Anish’s mere presence here – why else had he come except to see Semple’s art?

Semple shoved the keys into his pocket and let his bag slip to the floor. He stepped forward, his expression set hard, and was gratified to see Anish swallow uneasily. He didn’t back up, but Semple caught the sudden tensing of the muscles beneath his clothes, as though Anish was thinking about it.

“Who was it?”

“Who?” Anish asked, but his eyes were a little too steady, giving away the lie.

“The person who let you in.” Semple tilted his head. “Were they the one who got you the pink too? Or am I paying multiple people to betray me?”

“They don’t matter. Tell me – how did you do this?” Anish turned halfway to gesture toward Shift, though his gaze remained locked on Semple’s. The unicorn’s eyes showed white all around the edges and his haunches twitched like he was being pestered by invisible flies.

Semple moved toward him, shouldering past Anish; the other man was far bulkier and it should have been like shoving a brick wall, but he gave ground easily. Too easily. Semple didn’t let himself think on it, focusing on Shift instead. He felt a twinge of guilt at the unicorn’s evident stress; he had nearly forgotten him in his confusion at finding Anish here, but all magical creations were sensitive to strong emotions, and unicorns more so than most. He smoothed a hand down Shift’s neck, feeling faint tremors beneath the skin. “Where’s his device?” he asked, voice as soft as he could make it to avoid scaring Shift further.

Anish pointed silently.

Semple scooped it off the nearest table; the device looked like a small ring of cloth, seemingly cut from a larger tapestry. Threads of blue and gold sparkled in the weave, but no discernible image could be made out, only edges and vague shapes. He turned back to Shift and patted his muzzle in a brief goodbye, allowing the unicorn to whuffle warm air across his palm. A smile tugged at Semple’s mouth, and he swept his thumb across the device, murmuring the key words as quietly as he could, too aware of Anish’s presence just a few feet away. Shift’s ears pricked as though he’d heard his name called; his head lifted and then his entire body seemed to swirl away, draining of color and mass like water down the drain.

“How did you do that? Was it – “

Semple waved a hand, cutting Anish off. “You break into my studio, potentially endanger my animals, and expect me to answer your questions? Do you hear yourself?”

Anish’s mouth hung open for a moment, then he shut it without answering. He shifted his weight back onto his heels, straightening from his eager lean forward. He looked smaller, older; the bright fascinated light faded out of his eyes, leaving them dull and weary. “I’ll go,” he said quietly, after another awkward silence.

“Don’t.”

Anish frowned. “I… apologize for coming. It was wrong of me.” He tilted his head, studying Semple for some hint of reaction. A little bit of his former spark came back into his voice when he added, “Well? Is that what you wanted?”

“Don’t,” Semple repeated. “I want – I want –“ He flung up his hands and spun on his heel, stalking away from Anish in frustration. His chest felt full and tight of a hundred conflicting emotions and he couldn’t put a name to a single one of them. He nearly reached the outside door before he finally turned again and marched back toward Anish, who was simply waiting for him, hands empty at his sides and eyes wide. Semple’s hands were fists at his sides, but he shook them out and moved close enough to slap one onto Anish’s chest, shoving him back a step. “I want you to be the artist I wanted you to be! The one I admired. You could have been great, man. You could have done new things, important things.”

Anish’s eyes were narrowing, his mouth thinning to a pinched scowl, but he said nothing and didn’t pull away when Semple shook him by the shoulders.

“You had it all! The attention, the publicity, the new method – and this is what you did with it?” Semple’s hands lost their strength. He released Anish’s shoulders and let his palms slide tiredly down his arms. The anger fell out of him simultaneously; he shook his head, voice scarcely louder than a whisper. “Watches, man? Really? That’s what you kept Vantablack all to yourself for?”

“I – it’s just a start. I’m going to do something more, I just haven’t – “

Semple scoffed and turned away, but Anish grabbed his arm, wrenching him back. Their chests collided, and Semple lifted his chin to meet Anish’s frantic expression with a sneer.

“I’ll prove it to you,” Anish said, and then he was kissing Semple hard.

For a split second, Semple’s mind went entirely empty, white and blank as a lightening bolt. Then,  _Oh_ , he thought.  _Oh, so that’s what I wanted._

But not on these terms. He shoved Anish again, breaking the kiss, and pounced on him before he could do more than look shocked at himself. Semple fisted a hand in his hair, the coarse salt and pepper waves scratching at his fingers, and tugged Anish’s head to his preferred angle. Anish’s mouth fell open in a gasp at the sting in his scalp, and Semple took advantage of the opportunity to slip his tongue inside. He put all of his annoyance and disappointment and fucking finally recognized desire into the kiss, turned it so fierce and punishing that Anish’s earlier attempt felt frigid in comparison.

Anish kissed him back, hands scrabbling at Semple’s sides as he tried to pull him closer. His breath hitched as Semple tightened his fingers in his hair, quiet breathless groans escaping into the kiss. The sound sent sparks down Semple’s spine. Semple pulled back enough to lick at Anish’s lower lip, then deepened the kiss, fucking his tongue into Anish’s mouth. He pressed his hips to Anish’s and groaned at the erection he could feel even through their layers of clothing.

Semple shoved him back, wanting to press Anish up against something, anything, for leverage. There was a table in the way before they reached the nearest wall, and that seemed good enough; he steered Anish onto one of the high stools waiting there. When Anish’s thighs spilled open, Semple grabbed his fly and worked it down. Anish was wearing chinos. Of course he was.

“Your politics are awful and your fashion sense is equally bad,” Semple said, moving his lips across Anish’s cheek to bite at his ear lobe.

Anish’s back arched, pressing his chest to Semple’s. His breathing was ragged, but he managed a decent enough snarl. “What room do you have to talk? You dress like a rejected emo pop star from 2004.”

Semple hid a grin against the curve of Anish’s neck. “I’m impressed by that reference, gramps. You must be more in touch than you look, if you know what emo is.”

Anish would have responded, but Semple got his hand on his cock just then, and whatever Anish had been about to say was lost forever in a startled groan. Semple jacked him hard and fast, pausing only once to smear the precome pearling on the head down over the shaft, smoothing his way. Anish’s legs spread wider, inviting Semple to move in between them. The stool wobbled with the force of their rocking, then its feet skidded against the floor, moving back an inch with a loud screech. Neither of them paid it any attention. Anish leaned back onto the table behind him, propping his elbows onto its surface. He was making hungry, panting grunts despite obviously fighting to remain in control of himself; he bit his lip hard in an effort to stay silent. It drew blood – a single bead shone bright red against the pale chaps of his lips. He looked decadent and desperate and disheveled, nothing like the arrogant senior artist Semple remembered meeting in Chicago. He liked him better this way.

Semple pressed forward, his grip forming a tight ring around the base of Anish’s cock, and kissed him slowly. Anish began to whine impatiently, his hips bucking up into Semple’s fist in shallow, eager jerks. Semple gave in and began to move his hand up and around Anish’s cock again, tugging gently at the foreskin. He only had gotten two strokes in when he stopped. “Why am I doing all of the work?” He let go of Anish’s cock entirely, moved his hand to Anish’s thigh and dug his fingers into the meat there through the soft fabric of his khakis.

Anish leveraged partway up from the table and blinked dazedly. “What do you want me to do?”

The question was simple, but it made Semple’s heart pound. His choice. His command. Power. It coiled low in his belly, hot and straining. “Suck my cock.”

Anish was silent for what felt like a long moment, then the fingers of his hand twitched and he nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, okay.”

He stumbled off the high stool, following obediently as Semple backed away from him. They made it to the other side of the room, and Semple fell into an office chair, barely spinning it to face in the right direction in time. This put his gaze on a level with Anish’s belly; that wouldn’t work. “On your knees.”

Semple dropped, the thud of his knees against the wood floor loud in the empty building. Semple swallowed hard at the sight. It was getting easier, being in charge, as he got used to it. That didn’t make it less hot.

Anish reached for the fly of Semple’s jeans, but before he could undo the first button Semple knocked his hand away. “No.” Semple leaned back, forcing himself to look relaxed and confident, even if he didn’t entirely feel those things. He let his legs fall apart and stroked his hand down over his chest and stomach, then groped shamelessly at his own cock through his jeans. It felt good; what felt even better was the way Anish’s eyes traced his every movement. Semple continued the show, grinding the heel of his palm against his balls. He dragged his thumb up and down his cock, trying to tug the denim fabric tighter to make the bulge more visible. “Suck me through the jeans. Then, if you’re good, I’ll give you a taste.”

He wasn’t sure if Anish would go for it, but he seemed to be slipping into these roles as easily as Semple was. Anish leaned forward instantly, his hands on Semple’s knees to push his legs even further apart. He mouthed at the seam of Semple’s jeans. The denim was thick enough that he barely felt anything, but it certainly made for a pretty picture.

Semple settled his hand on top of Anish’s head, pushing him down harder. When he said, “Good boy,” he was surprised and pleased to hear his own words emerge in a throaty purr. Anish must have liked the sound too, because he groaned and stuck out his tongue, rubbing it against the jeans. Semple’s cock twitched at the pressure, but he felt no heat, no moisture – none of what he most wanted. “That’s enough.”

He tugged Anish back by the hair, then quickly unbuttoned his jeans and shucked them down over his hips. Anish was on him again as soon as his ass hit the chair, swallowing Semple down in one smooth motion. Semple groaned and let his head fall back. “You’ve done this before, huh? Yeah–" Semple’s voice cracked as Anish swirled his tongue over the head of his cock and rolled his balls in one hand. “Yeah, I can tell. You’re good at this.” Anish hummed at the praise, the vibration in his throat making Semple incapable of speaking more.

Neither of them had anything to say for the next several minutes anyway. Semple let his mind fill with the suction on his cock, the dirty  _pop_  when Anish briefly pulled off to catch his breath, and the sight of Anish Kapoor on his knees for Stuart Semple, his smug mouth full of cock and his eyes wet with exertion. It didn’t take long for him to finish.

When Semple had recovered enough to form coherent thoughts, he realized that Anish hadn’t yet come. He was sitting back on his heels, his cock stiff and jutting up from the open fly of his pants. Semple would have liked to take him onto his lap and jerk him to completion that way, but he didn’t think that would actually work given their respective body weights. Instead he slithered out of the chair to kneel in front of Anish, catching him by the shirt and dragging him forward into another kiss. He tasted of Semple’s come, salt and musk, and Semple chased the taste, licking at his mouth until Anish was trembling and gasping against him.

He took hold of Anish’s cock and slid his hand up and down it once, luxuriantly slow, then again fisted it tight at the base. “You want to come?”

Anish nodded, loose hair flopping into his eyes. His mouth hung open, red and wet and a bit swollen.

Semple constricted his fist just a little more and Anish’s breath caught in his throat, a moan punching out of him. “Are you going to let the rest of us use Vantablack?”

Anish managed to claw back to some semblance of reason. He said, with an impressive amount of annoyance given his position, “What, everyone?”

Of course everyone. That was the entire point of all of this: if one person had it, everyone should have it. Limiting access to two artists wasn’t much of an improvement over one. But Semple sensed that this was perhaps not the moment to expound on his beliefs; Anish had let him push pretty far, but he knew there were still limits. “Just me. For now.”

Anish ran his hand down Semple’s arm, coming to rest in a loose circle around his wrist. His hands were so much bigger than Semple’s own, but his grip was gentle, loose enough to be barely there. “All right. For you.”

Semple moved his hand, thumb stroking hard along the vein that ran up the underside of Anish’s cock, and it was only a few more seconds before Anish came, semen hitting Semple’s hand in hot white strings.

Afterward they lay together on the floor, sprawled out and sweaty. Semple shifted, trying to find a more comfortable spot, and tucked an arm behind his head. His legs were tangled with Anish’s and he had no desire to move somewhere more appropriate for a couple of mature adults. “You know, I’m going to hold you to what you said.”

Anish moved his head just enough to frown at him. “I don’t believe promises made under sexual duress are considered valid in court.”

“You aren’t going to hold out on me. Not when I’ve just proved how well we work together.” Semple rolled onto his side and waited until Anish mirrored him, then kissed him slow and deep. “I think we make a better team than enemies, don’t you?”

Anish shrugged irritatedly, but as his hands were exploring under Semple’s t-shirt, pushing up its hem to stroke the knobs of his lower spine, Semple didn’t take the protest too seriously. “Yeah,” Anish said. “I suppose we do.”

**Author's Note:**

> Notes: both the [watches](https://www.hodinkee.com/articles/mct-vantablack-hands-on) and the [unicorns](https://news.artnet.com/art-world/anish-kapoor-stuart-semple-color-wars-1014299?) are real developments in the Vantablack feud! The sex, probably not.
> 
> Happy Yuletide, Marginaliana! You had such a fun prompt! :)


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